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LIBRARY OF CONGRESS 

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021 929 548 



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OPtH& 




RIVER 



ARIZONA 



GRAND CANON 



COLOEADO EIYEK, 



ARIZONA, 



C. A. HIGGINS. 



With Original Illustrations by Thomas Moran, H. F. Fabny and 
F. H. Lungren. 



One Hundred and Thirty-sixth Thousand. 



PASSENGER DEPARTMENT, SANTA FE ROUTE, 

CHICAGO, 1900. 




WtB. MI«t.So«. 

2uS 05 



THE Colorado is one of the great rivers of North America. Formed in southern Utah by 
the confluence of the Green and Grand, it intersects the northwestern corner of Arizona, and, 
becoming the eastern boundary of Nevada and California, flows southward until it reaches 
tidewater in the Gulf of California, Mexico. It drains a territory of 300,000 square miles, and, 
traced back to the rise of its principal source, is 2,000 miles long. At two points, the Needles 
and Yuma on the California boundary, it is crossed by a railroad. Elsewhere its course lies 
far from Caucasian settlements and far from the routes of common travel, in the heart of a 
vast region fenced on the one hand by arid plains and on the other by formidable mountains. 
The early Spanish explorers first reported it to the civilized world in 1540, two separate 
expeditions becoming acquainted with the river for a comparatively short distance above its 
mouth, and another, journeying from the Moqui Pueblos northwestward across the desert, 
obtaining the first view of the Big Canon, failing in every efi"ort to descend the canon wall, 
and spying the river only from afar. Again, in 1776, a Spanish priest traveling southward 
through Utah struck o3' from the Virgen Eiver to the southeast and found a practicable 
crossing at a point that still bears the name " Vado de los Padres." For more than eighty 
years thereafter the Big Canon remained unvisited, except by the Indian, the Mormon herds- 
man and the trapper, although the Sitgreaves expedition of 1851, journeying westward, struck 
the Colorado about one hundred and fifty mile^».<ibove Yuma, and Lieutenant Whipple in 
1854 made a survey for a practicable 'railroad route along the thirty-fifth pai-allel, where the 
Atlantic and Pacific Railroad has since been constructed. The establishment of military posts 
in New Mexico and Utah having made desirable the use of a water-way for the cheap trans- 
portation of su2)plies, in 1857 the War Department dispatched an expedition in charge of 
Lieutenant Ives to explore the Colorado as far from its mouth as navigation should be found 
practicable. Ives ascended the river in a specially constructed steamboat to the head of Black 
Canon, a few miles below the confluence of the Virgen River in Nevada, where further navi- 
gation became impossible ; then, returning to the Needles, he set off" across the country toward 
the northeast. He reached the Big Caiion at Diamond Creek and at Cataract Creek in the 
spring of 1858, and from the latter point made a wide southward detour around the San 
Francisco peaks, thence northeastward to the Moqui Pueblos, thence eastward to Fort Defiance 
and so back to civilization. 

That is the history of the explorations of the Colorado up to twenty-five years ago. Its 
exact course was unknown for many hundred miles, even its origin in the junction of the 
Grand and Green Rivers being a matter of conjecture, it being diflicult to approach within a 
distance of two or three miles from the channel, while descent to the river's edge could be 
hazarded only at wide intervals, inasmuch as it lay in an appalling fissure at the foot of 
seemingly impassable cliff terraces that led down from the bordering plateau ; and an attempt 
at its navigation would have been courting death. It was known in a general way that the 



entire cliannel between Nevada and Utah was of the same titanic character, reaching its 
culmination nearly midway in its course through Arizona. In 1869 Maj. J. W. Powell under- 
took the exploration of the river w'ith nine men and four boats, starting from Green River 
City, on the Green River, in Utah. The project met with the most urgent remonstrance from 
those who were best acquainted with the region, including the Indians, who maintained that 
boats could not possibly live in any one of a score of rapids and falls known to them, to say 
nothing of the vast unknown stretches in which at any moment a Niagara might be disclosed. 
It was also currently believed that for hundreds of miles the river disappeared wholly beneath 
the surface of the earth. Powell launched his flotilla on May 24, and on August 30 landed 
at the mouth of the Yirgen River, more than one thousand miles by the river channel from 
the place of starting, minus two boats and four men. One of the men had left the expedition 
by way of an Indian reservation agency before reaching Arizona, and three, after holding out 
against unprecedented terrors for many weeks, had finally become daunted, choosing to 
encounter the perils of an unknown desert rather than to brave any longer the frightful 
menaces of that Stygian torrent. Tliese three, unfortunately making their appeai-ance on the 
plateau at a time when a recent depredation was colorably chargeable upon them, were killed 
by Indians, their story of having come thus far down the river in boats being wholly dis- 
credited by their captors. Powell's journal of the trip is a fascinating tale, written in a compact 
and modest style, which, in spite of its reticence, tells an epic story of purest heroism. It 
definitely established the scene of his exploration as the most wonderful geological and spec- 
tacular phenomenon known to mankind, and justified the name which had been bestowed upon 
it — The Grand Canon — sublimest of gorges; Titan of chasms. Many scientists have since 
visited it, and, in the aggregate, a considerable number of unjjrofessional lovers of nature; but 
until a few years ago no adequate facilities were provided for the general sightseer, and the 
world's most stupendous panorama was known principally through report, by reason of the 
discomforts and difficulties of the trip, which deterred all except the most indefatigable 
enthusiasts. Even its geographical location has been the subject of widespread misapprehension. 
As stated by Captain Button, in his admirable "Tertiary History of the Grand Caiion District," 
its title has been pirated for application to relatively insignificant canons in distant parts of 
the country, and thousands of tourists have been led to believe that they were viewing the 
Grand Caiion when, in fact, they looked upon a totally different scene, between which and the 
real Grand Canon there is no more comparison "than there is between the Alleghanies or 
Trosachs and the Himalayas." 

Tliere is but one Grand Canon. Nowhere in the world has its like been found. 

II. 

IT lies wholly in the northern part of Arizona. It is accessible from the north only at the 
cost of weeks of arduous travel, necessitating a special expedition with camp outfit and 

pack animals. From the south it is easily reached in a single day's journey by stage from 
the town of Flagstaff", an important station on the Santa Fe Pacific Railroad, which is a 
division of the Santa Fe Route. There is no other railroad within a distance of several 
hundred miles. 

In 1892 a tri-weekly stage line was permanently established between Flagstaff" and the 
Grand Canon. The entire distance is sixty-five miles, and it is covered in ten hours, by the 
aid of four relays. The route is nearly level, traversing the platform district which, taking 
name from the river, is known as the Colorado Plateau. The excellence of the roadway needs 



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no other testimony than the fact that the journey consumes so httle time. For long stretches 
it is as liard and smooth as a boulevard. The stage leaves Flagstaff in the morning, reaches 
a comfortable dinner station at noon, and dei:)Osits its passengers at a hotel on the rim of the 
most impressive portion of the Caiion before nightfall. The Canon Hotel is picturesquely located 
among the pines, on a grassy slope above one of the amphitheaters of the Canon. Excellent 
meals are provided. Elevated more than 7,000 feet above sea-level, the air is pure and exhil- 
arating, and the health-giving climate that is characteristic of the region, together with the 
charming environment of the pine forest, would make a fortnight's stay at the Canon Hotel a 
delightful and profitable outing, even were there no Grand Canon at hand. 

The stage returns to Flagstaff every other day. If it is necessary to be satisfied with a 
few hours' inspection, one may return the following morning after arrival, and thus see the 
Grand Canon in but two days' absence from Flagstaff. While so superficial a view will reveal 
only a fraction of its protean splendors, it will prove an everlasting memory. 





Drawn by Thomas Moran. 
MIDWAY STATION AT CEDAR RANCH. 



III. 



THE journey to the Cafion is greatly diversified in interest. Plunging at once into one of the 
parks that are peculiar to Arizona — forests of pine free from undergrowth, streaked with 
sunlight and seductively carpeted with grass — the road crosses a flank of the splendid San 
Francisco peaks, descending to level stretches where prairie dogs abound, again winding 
through rocky defiles, on past volcanic vent-holes in whose subterranean recesses the Cave 
Dwellers made their primitive home and where the hill slopes are thickly strewn with fragments 
of pottery ; past bare mountains of black cinder striped with red slag; over broad ranges where 
sheep and cattle browse and the tents of the herders gleam from the hillside where the infrequent 
spring pours out its flow ; threading the notches of slopes regularly set with cedar and piiion ; 
across gentle divides from whose summits the faint rosy hues of the Painted Desert may be seen 
in the northeast, and in the north the black jagged lines of mountain ranges indefinitely far 
away; then once more into the pines and down a short, steep descent to the terminus in a roman- 
tic glen near John Hance's cabin, some fifteen miles west of the confluence of the Little Colorado 
with the main river. 



In all the journey nothing has been encountered that could prepare the mindjfor tran- 
scendent scenery, save that in the last half mile two or three glimpses of what were guessed to be 
pinkish cliffs far to right and left were shadowed faintly through the trees. And certainly there 
is nothing that portends the heroic in the sylvan scene where at last the traveler quits the stage. 
Small herbage and flowers of every hue grow at the foot of the pines, among pretty rock frag- 
ments of variegated color. Save for a single crag, whose gray crest barely tops the northward 
slope of the glen, a hundred yards away, there is no hint of any presence foreign to the peaceful 
air of a woodland glade, denizened by birds and squirrels, innocent even of the rumor of such a 
thing as the Grand Caiion. The visitor, smitten with a sudden fear of bitter disappointment in 
store, strides eagerlj' up the slope to put the vaunted Canon to the test. Without an instant's 
warning he finds himself upon the verge of an unearthly spectacle that stretches beneath his feet 
to the far horizon. Stolid indeed is he if he can front that awful scene without quaking knee or 
tremulous breath. 

IV. 

AN inferno, swathed in soft celestial fires; a whole chaotic under-world, just emptied of 
J[\^ primeval floods and waiting for a new creative word ; a boding, terrible thing, unflinchingly 
real, yet spectral as a dream, eluding all sense of perspective or dimension, outstretching the 
faculty of measurement, overlapping the confines of definite apprehension. The beholder is at 
first unimpressed by any detail ; he is overwhelmed by the ensemble of a stupendous panorama, a 
thousand square miles in extent, that lies wholly beneath the eye, as if he stood upon a mountain 
peak instead of the level brink of a fearful chasm in the plateau whose opposite shore is thirteen 
miles away. A labyrinth of huge architectural forms, endlessly varied in design, fretted with 
ornamental devices, festooned with lace-like webs formed of talus from the upper cliffs and 
painted with every color known to the palette in pure transparent tones of marvelous delicacy. 
Never was picture more harmonious, never flower more exquisitely beautiful. It flashes instant 
communication of all that architecture and painting and music for a thousand years have grop- 
ingly striven to express. It is the soul of Michael Angelo and of Beethoven. 

A canon, truly, but not after the accepted type. An intricate system of caiions, rather, each 
subordinate to the river channel in the midst, which in its turn is subordinate to the total 
effect. That river channel, the profoundest depth, and actually more than six thousand feet 
below the point of view, is in seeming a rather insignificant trench, attracting the eye more by 
reason of its somber tone and mysterious suggestion than by any appreciable characteristic of a 
chasm. It is nearly five miles distant in a straight line, and its uppermost rims are 3,000 feet 
beneath the observer, whose measuring capacity is entirely inadequate to the demand made by 
such magnitudes. One cannot believe the distance to be more than a mile as the crow flies, 
before descending the wall or attempting some other form of actual measurement. Mere 
brain knowledge counts for little against the illusion under which the organ of vision is here 
doomed to labor. That red cliflT upon your right, darkening from white to gray, yellow and 
brown as your glance descends, is taller than the Washington monument. The Auditorium in 
Chicago would not cover one-half its perpendicular span. Yet it does not greatly impress you. 
You idly toss a pebble toward it, and are surprised to note how far the missile falls short. 
Subsequently you learn that the cliflT is a good half mile distant. If you care for an abiding 
sense of its true proportions, go over to the trail that begins beside its summit and clamber 
down to its base and back. You will return some hours later, and with a decided respect 
for a small Grand Canon cliS. Relatively it is insignificant; in that sense your first estimate 

10 




Drawn by Thomas Mo7'an. 



HEAD OF THE OLD HANCE TRAIL. 



was correct. Were Vulcan to cast it bodily into the chasm tlirectly 
beneath your feet, it would pass for a bowlder, if indeed it wei-e 
discovei-able to the unaided eye. Yet the immediate chasm itself is 
only the first step of a long terrace that leads down to the innermost 
gorge and the river. Roll a heavy stone to the rim and let it go. 
It falls sheer the height of a church or an Eifiel Tower, according to 
your position, and explodes like a bomb on a projecting ledge. If, 
happily, any considerable fragments remain, they bound onward like 
elastic balls, leaping in wild parabola from point to point, snapping 
trees like straws, bursting, crash- 
ing, thundering down until they 
make a last plunge over the brink 
of a void, and then there comes 
languidly up the cliff sides a faint, 
distant roar, and your bowlder 
that had withstood the buffets of 
centuries lies scattered as wide as 
Wycliffe's ashes, although the final 
fragment has lodged only a little 
way, so to speak, below the rim. 
Such performances are frequently 
given in these amphitheatres with- 
out human aid, by the mere un- 
dermining of the rain, or perhaps 
it is here that Sisyphus rehearses 
his unending task. Often in the 
silence of night a tremendous frag- 
ment may be heard crashing from 
terrace to terrace like shocks of 
thunder peal. 

The spectacle is so symmet- 
rical, and so completely excludes 
the outside world and its accus- 
tomed standards, it is with diffi- 
culty one can acquire any notion 
of its immensity. Were it half as 
deep, half as broad, it would he 
no less bewildering, sO utterly 
does it baffle human grasp. Some- 
thing may be gleaned from the 

account given by geologists. What is known to them as the Grand Caiion District lies prin- 
cipally in northwestern Arizona, its length from northwest to southeast in a straight line being 
about f 80 miles, its width 125 miles, and its total area some 15,000 square miles. Its northerly 
beginning, at the high plateaus in southern Utah, is a series of terraces, many miles' broad, 
dropping like a stairway step by step to successively lower geological formations, until^in Arizona 
the platform is reached which borders the real chasm and extends southward beyond far into 
the central part of that territory. It is the theory of geologists that 10,000 feet of strata, have 
been swept by erosion from the surface of this entire platform, whose present uppermost 

13 




Brairn by II. F. Farny. 
THE STAGE TERMINUS. 



formation is the Carboniferous; tlie deduction being based upon the fact that the missing Per- 
mian, Mesozoic and Tertiary formations, which belong above this Carboniferous in the series, are 
found in their place at the beginning of the northern terraces referred to. The theory is fortified 
by many evidences supplied by examination of the district, where, more than anywhere else, 
mother earth has laid bare the secrets of her girlhood. The climax in this extraordinary 
example of erosion is, of course, the chasm of the Grand Canon proper, wliich, were the 
missing strata restored to the adjacent jilateau, would be 16,000 feet deep. The layman is apt 
to stigmatize such an assertion as a vagary of theorists, and until the argument has been heard 
it does seem incredible that water should have carved such a trough in solid rock. It is 
easier for the imagination to conceive it as a work of violence, a sudden rending of earth's 
crust in some huge volcanic fury; but it appears to be true that the whole region was repeat- 
edly lifted and submerged, both under the ocean and under a fresh-water sea, and that during 
the period of the last upheaval the river cut its gorge. Existing as the di-ainage system of a 
vast territory, it had the right of way, and as the plateau deliberately rose before the pressure 
of the internal forces, slowly, as grind the mills of the gods, through a period to be measured 
by thousands of centuries, the river kept its bed worn down to the level of erosion; sawed 
its channel free, as the saw cuts the log that is thrust against it. Tributaries, traceable now- 
only by dry lateral gorges, and the gradual but no less effective process of weathering, did 
the rest. 

Beginning on the plateau level on the Canon's brink, the order of the rock formations 
above the river, according to Captain Button, is as follows: 

1. Cherty limestone, 240 feet. 6. Red Wall limestone, 1,.500 feet. 

2. Upper Aubrey limestone, 320 feet. 7. Lower Carboniferous sandstone, 550 feet. 

3. Cross-bedded sandstone, 380 feet. S. Quartzite base of Carboniferous, 180 feet. 

4. Lower Aubrey sandstone, 9.50 feet. 9. Archasan. 

5. Upper Red Wall sandstone. 400 feet. 

The total vertical depth is more tlian a mile. 



ONLY by descending into the Canon may one arrive at anything like comprehension of its 
proportions, and the descent cannot be too urgently commended to every visitor who is 
sufficiently robust to bear a reasonable amount of fatigue. But few practicable paths 
down the Canon wall exist throughout its entire length. One of these, the old Hance trail, 
begins within half a mile of the stage terminus. The new trail is distant only half a mile 
farther; and three miles away is the Cameron trail. The location of the Canon camp thus 
affords magnificent views from the rim and convenient ways of access to the Canon depths 
and the river. The first mentioned trail has been practically superseded; the others may be 
traversed nearly all the way on horseback in safetj'; but the following notes of a descent of 
the old Hance trail when there was no other may serve to indicate the nature of such an 
experience })efore its asperities were softened : 

"For the first two miles it is a sort of Jacob's ladder, zigzagging at an uni-elenting pitch 
down a steep and nearly uniform decline caused by a sliding geological fault and centuries 
of frost and rain. At the end of two miles a comparatively gentle slope is reached, known as 
the First Level, some 2,.500 feet below the rim; that is to say — for such figures have to be 
impressed objectively ujjon the mind — five times the height of St. Peter's, the Pyramid of Cheops, 
or the Strasburg Cathedral ; eight times the height of the Bartholdi Statue of Liberty ; eleven 




Draicn by Thomas Moran 



LOOKING UP THE TRAIL 



times the height of Bunker Hill Monument. Looking back from this level the huge pic- 
turesque towers that border the rim shrink to pigmies and seem to crown a perpendicular 
wall, unattainably far in the sky. Yet less than one-half the descent has been made, and less 
than one-third the entire distance of the trail to the river accomplished. Hance's Rock Cabin 
lies only a short distance ahead, where dinner and rest are to be had under the shade of 
cottonwoods by the side of a living spring. Farther on, the trail continues down a widening 
gorge plentifully set with, shrubs and spangled, in season, with the bloom of the yucca, prickly 
pear, primrose, marigold and a scoi-e of unfamiliar showy flowers, white, blue, red and yellow, 
surprisingly fresh and vigorous above a dry, red, stony soil, ymall lizards dart across the 
path — brown lizards, spotted lizards, striped lizards, lizards with tails of peacock blue — and 
an occasional horned toad scraml)les out of the way. No other reptile is encountered. Soon 
the course of a clear rivulet is reached, whose windings are followed to the end. The red wall 
limestone gives place to dark-brown sandstone, whose perfectly horizontal strata rapidly rise 
above the head to prove the rate of descent along the apparently gentle decline. Overshadowed 
bv this sandstone of chocolate hue the way grows gloomy and forelioding, and the gorge 

narrows greatly. The travel- 
er stops a moment beneath 
a slanting cliff 500 feet high, 
where theru is an Indian 
grave and pottery scattered 
about. A gigantic niche has 
been worn in the face of this 
cavernous cliff, which, in 
recognition of its fancied 
Egyptian character, was 
named the Temple of Sett 
by the i^ainter, Thomas 
Moran. A little beyond this 
temple it becomes necessary 
to abandon the animals. The 
river is still a mile and a 
half distant. The way nar- 
rows now to a mere notch, 
where two wagons could 
barely pass, and the granite 
begins to tower gloomily 
overhead, for we have drop- 
ped below the sandstone and 
liave entered the archasan 
— a frowning black rock, 
streaked, veined and swirled 
with vivid red and white, 
smoothed and polished by 
the rivulet and beautiful 
as a mosaic. Obstacles are 
encountered in the form ot steep interposing crags, past which the brook has found a way, but 
over which the pedestrian must clamber. After these lesser difficulties come sheer descents, 
which at present are passed by the aid of ropes. The last considerable drop is a forty-foot bit 
by the side of a pretty cascade, where there are just enoutrh irregularities in the wall to give 
toe-hold. The narrowed cleft becomes exceedingly wayward in its course, turning abruptly to 
right and left, and working down into twilight depths. It is very still. At every turn one 
looks to see the embouchure upon the river, anticipating the sudden shock of the unintercepted 
roar of waters. When at last this is reached, over a final downward clamber, the traveler stands 
upon a sandy rift confronted by nearly vertical walls many hundred feet high, at whose base 
a black torrent pitches in a gicldying onward slide that gives him momentarily the sensation 
of slipping into an abyss. 

" With so little labor may one come to the Colorado River in tlie heart of its most tremendous 
channel, and gaze upon a sight that heretofore has had fewer witnesses than have the wilds of 
Africa. Dwarfed by such [irodigious mountain shores, which rise immediately from the water at 




I'll liij TlioiiKis Jlo/'ini. 



A RESTING PLACE. 



an angle that would deny footing to a mountain sheep, it is not easy to estimate confidently the 
width and volume of the river. Choked hy the stubborn granite at this point, its width is prob- 
ably between two hundred and fifty and three hundred feet, its velocity fifteen miles an hour, and 
its volume and turmoil equal to the Whirlpool Rapids of Niagara. Its rise in time of heavy rain 
is rapid and appalling, for the walls shed almost instantly all the water that falls upon them. 
Drift is lodged in the crevices thirty feet overhead. For only a few hundred yards is the tortuous 
stream visible, but its eflect upon the senses is perhaps the greater for that reason. Issuing as 
from a mountain side, it slides with oily smoothness for a space and suddenly breaks into violent 
waves that comb back against the current and shoot unexpectedly here and there, while the 
volume sways tide-like from side to side, and long curling breakers form and hold their outline 
lengthwise of the shore, despite the seemingly irresistible velocity of the water. The river is 
laden with drift, huge tree trunks, which it tosses like chips in its terrible play. 

" Standing upon that shore one can barely credit Powell's achievement, in spite of its absolute 
authenticity. Never was a more magnificent self-reliance displayed than by the man who not 
only undertook the passage of Colorado River but won his way. And after viewing a fraction of 
the scene at close range, one cannot hold it to the discredit of three of his companions that they 
abandoned the undertaking not far below this point. The fact that those who persisted got 
through alive is hardly more astonishing than that any should have had the hardihood to persist. 
For it could not have "been alone the privation, the infinite toil, the unending suspense in constant 
menace of death that assaulted their courage ; these they had looked for ; it was rather the 
unlifted gloom of those tartarean depths, the unspeakable horrors of an endless valley of the 
shadow of death, in which every step was irrevocable. 

" Returning to the spot where the animals were abandoned, camp is made for the night. Next 
morning the way is retraced. Not the most fervid pictures of a poet's fancy could transcend the 
glories then revealed in the depths of the Canon ; inky shadows, pale gildings of lofty spires, 
golden splendors of sun beating full on facades of red and yellow, obscurations of distant peaks 
by veils of transient shower, glimpses of white towers half drowned in purple haze, suffusions of 
rosy light blended in reflection from a hundred tinted walls. Caught up to exalted emotional 
heights the beholder becomes unmindful of fatigue. He mounts on wings. He drives the chariot 
of the sun." 

VI. 

HAVING returned to the plateau, it will be found that the descent into the Canon has 
bestowed a sense of intimacy that almost amounts to a mental grasp of the scene. The 
imposing Temple of Sett will be recognized after close scrutiny in a just determinable 
penstroke of detail. A memorably gorgeous Olympian height that dominated everything for 
the space of a mile will be seen to be nothing more than the perpendicular front of the Red 
Wall limestone, topped up and away by retreating summits, hidden from below, that reduce 
it now to the unimportance of a mere girdle. The verdant, flowered expanse of notable 
ruggedness below the Rock Cabin will be discoverable in a small smooth patch of marly hue. 
The terrific deeps that part the walls of hundreds of castles and turrets of mountainous bulk 
will he apprehended mainly through the memory of upward looks from the bottom, while 
towers and obstructions and yawning fissures that were deemed events of the trail will be 
wholly indistinguishable, although they are known to lie somewhere flat beneath the eye. 
The comparative insignificance of what are termed grand sights in other parts of the world is 
now clearly revealed. Twenty Yosemites might lie unperceived anywhere below. Niagara, 
that Mecca of marvel seekers, would not here possess the dignity of a trout stream. Your 
companion, standing at a short distance on the verge, is an insect to the eye. 

Still such particulars cannot long hold the attention, for the panorama is the real over- 
mastering charm. It is never twice the same. Although you think you have spelt out every 
temple and peak and escarpment, as the angle of sunlight changes there begins a ghostly 
advance of colossal forms from the farther side, and what you had taken to be the ultimate 




Drawn hy Thomas Moran. 



IN THE GRANITE, OLD HANCE TRAIL. 




wall is seen to be made up of 
still other isolated sculptures, 
revealed now for the first time 
by silhouetting shadows. The 
scene incessantly changes, flush- 
ing and fading, advancing into 
crystalline clearness, retiring 
into slumberous haze. Should 
it chance to have rained heavily 
in the night, next morning the 
Canon is completely filled with 
fog. As the sun mounts, the 
curtain of mist suddenly breaks 
into cloud fleeces, and while 
you gaze these fleeces rise and 
dissipate, leaving the Canon 
bare. At once around the bases 
of the lowest cliffs white pufls 
begin to appear, creating a scene 
of uni^aralleled beauty as their 
dazzling cumuli swell and rise 
and their number multiplies, 
until once more they overflow 
the rim, and it is as if you stood 
upon some land's end looking 
down upon a formless void, 
comes the complete dissipation, and again the 
marshaling in the depths, the upward advance, the total 
suffusion and the sjjeedy vanishing, repeated over and 
over until the warm walls have expelled their saturation. 
Long may the visitor loiter uj^on the rim, powerless 
to shake loose from the charm, tirelessly intent upon 
the silent transformations until the sun is low in the west. Then 
the Caiion sinks into mysterious purple shadow, the far Shinumo 
Altar is tipj^ed with a golden ray, and against a leaden horizon 
the long line of the Echo Cliffs reflects a soft brilliance of inde- 
scribable beauty, a light that, elsewhere, surely never was on sea or 
land. Then darkness fa' Is, and should there be a moon, the scene in 
part revives in silver light, a thousand spectral forms projected from 
inscrutable gloom ; dreams of mountains, as in their sleep the}- brood 
on things eternal. 




fe. 



Then quickly 




Dnucn hij II. F. Farmj. 



ON THE TRAIL. 




Drawn by Jb'. H. Luwjvk.ii,. 

AN EVENING AT THE CANON CAMP, 



CLIFF DWELLINGS. 



At several points upon 
the rim of the Grand Canon, 
both east and west of the 
stage terminus, the razed 
walls of ancient stone dwell- 
ings may be seen. They 
are situated upon the verge 
of the precipice, in one in- 
stance crowning an out- 
standing tower that is con- 
nected with the main wall 
by only a narrow saddle, 
and protected on every 
other hand by the per- 
pendicular depths of the 
Caiion. The world does not 
contain another fortress so 
triumphantly invulnerable 
to primitive warfare, nor 
a dwelling-place that can 
equal it in sublimity. It 
will be found upon one of 
the salients of Point Mo ran. 

Scattered southward over the plateau, other ruins of similar 
character have been found. Perfect specimens of pottery and otlier 
domestic utensils have been exhumed in small number, and the rich 
and varied archfeological collections that have so recently rewarded 
systematic examination of prehistoric ruins in other parts of the 
country, whose treasures were thought to have been exhausted, 
would seem to warrant careful search of this region, where the 
known ruins have been but superficially examined, and doubtless 
many more await discovery. 

The most famous group, and the largest aggregation, is found in 
Walnut Caiion, eight miles southeast from Flagstaff. This caiion is 

several hundred feet deep and some three zniles long, with steep terraced walls of limestone. 
Along the shelving terraces, under beetling projections of tlie strata, are scores of these quaint 
abodes. The larger are divided into four or five compartments by cemented walls, many parts of 
which are still intact. It is believed that these ancient people customarily dwelt upon the plateau 
above, retiring to their fortifications when attacked by an enemy. 




CLIFF DWELLING 





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CAVE DWELLINGS. 

Nine miles from Flagstaff, and only half a mile from the stage road to tlie Gi'and 
Canon, these remarkable ruins are to be seen, upon the summit and farther side of an extinct 
crater whose slopes are buried deep in black and red gravel-like cinder. The Caves, so-called, 
were the vent holes of the volcano in the time of the eruptions of lava and ashes that have so 
plentifully covered the region for many miles about — countless ragged caverns opening directly 
under foot and leading by murky windings to unknown deeps in the earth's crust. Many are 
simple pot-holes a few yards in depth, their subterranean leads choked up and concealed. Othere 
yawn black, like burrows of huge beasts of prey. In many instances they are surrounded by 
loose stone walls, parts of which are standing just as when their singular inhabitants peered 
through their crevices at an approaching foe. Broken pottery abounds, scattered in small frag- 
ments like a talus to the very foot of the hill. The character of the pottery is similar to that 
found in the Cliff Dwellings, and it is probable that the Cave Dwellers and the Cliff Dwellers 
were the same people. The coarser vessels are simply glazed, or roughly corrugated ; the smaller 
ones are decorated by regular indentations, in imitation of the scales of the rattlesnake, or painted 
in black and white geometrical designs. 

Inferentially, these mysterious people, like the Cliff Dwellers, were of the same stock as the 
Pueblo Indians of our day. How long ago they dwelt here cannot be surmised, save roughly from 
the appearance of extreme age that characterizes many of the ruins, and the absence of native 
traditions concerning them. Their age has been estimated at from six to eight hundred years. 




CAVE DWELLING, NEAR FLAGSTAFF. 




Drawn by Thomas Moran. 



CLIFF DWELLINGS. WALNUT CANON. 



THE NEW LINE TO THE GRAND CANON. 



The Santa Fe & Grand Canyon Railroad is now in operation from Williams, Arizona, to 
Anitas Junction, Arizona, a distance of 47 toiles. The railroad is under construction from Anitas 
Junction to the head of Bright Angel Trail on the rim of the Grand Cation, a distance of 20 miles. 

Pending the completion of the railroad, the stage will meet trains at Anitas Junction and carry 
passengers to the hotel near the head of Bright Angel Trail. 

The time schedule between Williams and Bright Angel is as follows: 

GOING IN 

Train leaves Williams Daily 12.30 pm 

" arrives Anitas Junction " 3.00 pm 

Stage leaves Anitas Junction " , 3.00 pm 

" arrives Bright Angel " 6.00 pm 

COMING OUT 

vStage leaves Bright Angel Daily 1.30 pm 

" arrives Anitas Junction " 3.45 pm 

Train leaves Anitas Junction " 4.00 pm 

" arrives Williams " 6.30 pm 

The hotel is a temporary structure but it provides comfortable accommodations for 35 people. 
The rate at the hotel is fe.oo per day, American plan. 

Horses and conveyances can be had at the hotel. Saddle stock, ;f2.5o per diem on rim of the 
Caiion and I3.00 per diem for use into the Caiion. 

Guides for parties desiring to go down the trails into the Caiion can be found at the hotel. 
Their charges are $5.00 per diem. 

The rate from Williams to Bright Angel and return is 1 10.00. 

The old route to the Caiion via Flagstaff has been abandoned. 

Excellent hotel accommodations may be had at Williams. 



Los Angeles, April 19, 1900. 



SAN FRANCISCO PEAKS. 

These magnificent peaks, visible from every part of the country within a radius of a hundred 
miles, lie just north of Flagstaff. They are four in number, but form one mountain. From Flag- 
stafi a road has been constructed to one of the peaks, Mt. Humphrey, whose summit is 12,750 
feet above sea-level. It is a good mountain road, and the entire distance from Flagstaff is only 
about ten miles. The trij) to the summit and back is easily made in one day. 

Mr. A. Doyle, of Flagstaff, is the owner of the trail to Humphrey's Peak, and acts as guide 
when desired. He provides the necessary equipment, including his own services, at a reasonable 
cost. Independent arrangements may be made if desired, but in that case toll is charged for use 
of the trail. 

The summit of Mt. Humphrey affords one of the noblest of mountain views, the panorama 
including the nortli wall of the Grand Caiion, the Painted Desei-t, the Moqui villages, the Super- 
stition Mountains near Phtenix, many lakes, and far glimpses over a wide circle. 



COST OF A TRIP TO THE GRAND CANON, STAGE 
SCHEDULE, HOTELS, ETC. 

The stage fare from Flagstaff to the Grand Canon and return is ^15.00. Stage tickets may be 
purchased on arrival at Flagstaff, or special railroad tickets, bearing stage coupons, may be 
obtained by the tourist. 

The stage leaves Flagstaff for the Grand Caiion after breakfast every Monday, Wednesday 
and Friday morning, except during the winter months, returning Tuesday, Thursday and Saturday 
mornings. The office of J. W. Thurbur, manager of the Grand Caiion Stage Line Company, is 
conveniently situated on the depot platform, and visitors will find it to their advantage to apply 
to him immediately upon arrival and secure stage accommodations. 

The cost to Grand Caiion visitors of hotel accommodations, at Flagstaff, the Caiion and the 
midway lunch station at Cedar Ranch, is about $3.00 per day. 

Camping outfits, pack animals, saddle horses, guides, rough clothing, stout shoes and general 
supplies can be procured at the Caiion camp by parties who desire to descend the trails or make 
excursions along the rim. 

There are several hotels in Flagstaff, and visitors who chance to arrive in town between the 
regular stage runs, as scheduled above, will have no difiiculty in spending time agreeably in 
the interim. In addition to the San Francisco Peaks and the Cliff and Cave Dwellings, Fisher's 
Tanks may be reached by a short and agreeable drive, and fifteen miles to the south, in Oak 
Creek Canon, there is really excellent trout fishing. 



Flagstaff is situated on the Santa Fe Pacific Railroad, a division of the through California 
line of the Santa Fe Eoute. 

Special tickets to the Grand Caiion, containing stage coupon, are sold at reduced rates by- 
agents of the Santa Fe Eoute, and by agents of connecting lines, in the principal cities of the 
United States. 

Inquiries as to cost of tickets, time of trains, etc., may be addressed to any agent of the 
Santa Fe Route, or to the undersigned, a^ may be most convenient. 

W. J. BLACK, C. A. HIGGINS, 

General Passenger Agent, A. T. & S. F. R'y, Asst. General Passenger Agent, A. T. & S. F. R'y, 

ToPEKA, Kan. Chicago. 

J. J. BYRNE, 

W. S. KEENAN, 
General Passenger Agent, So. Cal. R'y, Santa Fe 

Pac. R. R. and S. F. & S. J. V.R'y, General Passenger Agent, G. C. & S. F. R'y, 

Los Angeles. Galveston, Tex. 

JNO. L. TRUSLOW, 

General Agent, Passenger Dept., Santa Fe Pac. R. R. 

and San Fran. & San Joaquin Valley R'y, 

San Francisco. 




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